Check out United States v. 32.42 Acres of Land, No. 10-56568 (9th Cir. June 14, 2012), the case in which the Ninth Circuit held that a federal taking of state land (for a Navy base in San Diego) extinguishes the state's tidelands public trust, even if the property is later conveyed to a private party. California argued that the state's public trust lay dormant while the feds held the property, but was "quiescent" and would "re-emerge" upon any transfer from the U.S. to a private party.
We won't go through the facts of the case (the opinion is short, and an interesting read), but here's the short story: the feds condemned state-owned land, which was subject to California's common law public tidelands trust because it was under water at the time of California's admission to the Union. The state argued that its public trust rights would essentially lie dorman while the federal government held the land, but if it were to be conveyed to a private party, the tidelands trust would "re-emerge," and the property would once again be subject to public rights. The court rejected the argument:
The Lands Commission contends that the public trust is an aspect of state sovereignty that the federal government is without power to extinguish, or at least has no power to extinguish in this case. The Lands Commission argues that California’s interest in its public trust rights is as important as the United States’ interest in its power of eminent domain. The Lands Commission urges us to reconcile these interests by holding that the declaration of taking does not extinguish public trust rights, but instead only makes the public trust "quiescent," such that the public trust has no effect while the United States owns the Property, but can "re-emerge" if the land is later sold to a private party. This solution might be considered if we were charged with reconciling immovable public trust rights with the powerful force of eminent domain. But no such conflict of values exists. None of the authorities discussing the equal-footing doctrine cited by the Lands Commission inhibits or restricts the federal government from exercising its constitutional power of eminent domain. When and to the extent that state law public trust rights conflict with federal takings law, the Supremacy Clause dictates that federal takings law prevails. U.S. Const., art. VI, cl. 2.
Slip op. at 6885-86.
If you are an Equal Footing Doctrine, navigational servitude, or Constitutional history wonk, savor this one - cases like this don't come around all that often.
United States v. 32.42 Acres of Land, No. 10-56568 (June 14, 2012)